EIT Call for Proposals 2025 (HORIZON-EIT-2025-KIC-WATER)

Together with excellence, impact has been one of the guiding principles of the EIT since its creation. In a context of economic frailty, demonstrating a tangible and measurable impact is essential. The EIT Community is characterised by a focus on results and on achieving long-lasting impact in the way the EU approaches and manages innovation. It is therefore critical that the KIC demonstrates substantial impact at the socioeconomic level over time, and significant progress towards achieving its mission and objectives. The KIC should harvest intellectual, human, material and financial resources to create valuable outputs such as innovation communities, high quality curricula, start-ups, innovative products, services, technologies, through which it develops and sustains value-added business, enhances competencies necessary for innovation and entrepreneurship, and for developing solutions to major societal challenges.

A KIC is expected to create the following impacts:

• technological/economic/innovation impact by influencing the creation and growth of companies, as well as the creation and deployment at scale of new innovative solutions to address the global challenges, creating direct and indirect jobs and mobilising additional public and private investments;
   
• educational impact by strengthening human capital in research and innovation, enhancing innovative and entrepreneurial skills both at individual and organisational levels and fostering the creation and diffusion of knowledge and innovation openly within society;
   
• societal impact, including the impact derived by the delivery of systematic solutions within and beyond the EIT Community, also through Cross-KIC activities7, by addressing EU policy priorities in the Water, Marine and Maritime Sectors and Ecosystems (‘Water’) through innovative solutions, engagement with citizens and end-users and by strengthening the uptake of innovative solutions in these areas in society.

This KIC's approach to building systemic impact should be aligned with and contribute to Horizon Europe impact pathway approach as well as the EIT Impact Framework KPIs.

Objective

The European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) is a key driver of sustainable European economic growth and competitiveness. It reinforces the innovation capacity of the EU and its Member States to address the grand challenges facing European society.

During the 2021 to 2027 period, the EIT contributes to the general objectives of Horizon Europe – the Framework Programme for Research and Innovation by integrating the entrepreneurship-driven ‘knowledge triangle’ of business, higher education and research to boost disruptive innovation across Europe.

To further enhance its impact and to incentivise the innovations needed to meet new societal challenges, the EIT will, as established in the EIT Regulation and EIT Strategic Innovation Agenda (SIA) 2021-2027 gradually expand its portfolio of Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs). With this Call for Proposals, the EIT launches the selection process for a new KIC in the thematic area of Water, Marine and Maritime Sectors and Ecosystems.

Partners in an EIT KIC design a realistic, specific, measurable, achievable and time-dependent strategy to address the concrete challenges posed in their thematic field. The strategy is accompanied by specific, relevant and measurable strategic objectives. This strategy must be aligned with the EIT’s strategic objectives, cover at least 7 years and be based on the overriding principle of knowledge triangle integration, impact and excellence.

EIT KICs’ strategic outlook considers where the highest innovation and commercialisation potential lies, and where the most significant impact can be achieved through integrating entrepreneurship and skills education, innovation and business creation / acceleration.

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